Archive for February, 2011

LOS ANGELES – ABC producers have to be lamenting their decision to hire Charlie Sheen and Lindsay Lohan as co-hosts of the 83rd Annual Academy Awards, which aired Sunday night. What started as a promising idea ended in disaster when the erratic stars stayed true to recent form and nearly sank the broadcast with their bizarre behavior.

Sheen, whose sitcom, What Happened to Emilio?, has been put on hiatus for the remainder of the television season, showed up 20 minutes late, forcing producers to fill the gap with old Popeye cartoons. The troubled actor walked on stage fully nude and, instead of delivering a monologue, beat up a prostitute and shouted profanities for 5 minutes. He was arrested and taken into custody by police just before the Best Animated Short film award was announced, prompting presenter Tom Hanks to quip, “What the f**k?”

Audiences were shocked when many of the favorites in the major award categories, including Natalie Portman for Best Actress and The King’s Speech for Best Picture, failed to capture statuettes. It was later alleged that Sheen’s co-host, Lohan, had stolen the sealed envelopes announcing the winners and replaced them with her own. The originals were found in the trunk of Lohan’s car, which she initially claimed was not hers, despite the registration card in the glove compartment with her name on it.

She later said, ‘Me and Price Waterhouse Cooper are, like, really good friends, so I was just borrowing the envelopes from him.”

To her credit, the plucky star finished her hosting duties without the help of Sheen.

Despite the grumbling of some nominees who walked away from the awards ceremony empty handed, ABC producers said that, once a winner’s name is read on the air, the victory is official. With that in mind, here are yesterday’s winners in the major categories:

WASHINGTON DC – It’s no secret that America’s rising obesity epidemic has been accompanied by growing incidences of heart failure, diabetes, and stroke. Now medical researchers are reporting a new, even deadlier obesity-related disease that threatens to become the worst health scourge of the century: Extra-Large Pox.

Unlike its more diminutive cousin, small pox, extra-large pox targets mostly the overweight. The pox can range in size from a tea cup saucer to a manhole cover, depending on the girth of the sufferer. The wounds often pass entirely through the victim’s body, allowing relatives to peak through and wave to someone taking a picture on the other side.

“It’s humiliating,” says extra-large pox sufferer Bertha Quake, 31, who weighed 605 pounds before the disease struck. “My nephews shoot nerf darts through my belly, and I have to just stand there in the middle of the room like a big ol’ Hasbro accessory.”

Since what happens to skinny, pretty people is more newsworthy, we asked Dr. Carl Hill of Miskatonic University in Massachusetts what we should expect if someone skinny and pretty like Megan Fox or Olivia Wilde acquired extra-large pox.

“Wow. You’re talking about entire heads or torsos just popping out of existence,” he explains. “Small pox is bad enough, like a size two maybe. With XLP, you’re talking about a size 16. Even 18.”

When asked just how deadly this insidious demon was, Dr. Hill said, “Well, you really shouldn’t attribute malevolent will to a disease. A virus has no brain, so you’re really just empowering the condition by making it sound so evil, which does no favors for the victim.”

He went on to say, “Think of an illness as,” at which point we stopped recording because he wasn’t saying anything that will scare readers.

A bizarre mutation of extra-large pox has already emerged this winter, which scientists are calling Tron Pox, or TP for short. TP causes it’s victims to be reduced to binary code and disappear into their video game consoles, where they must become part of the cyber action and kill or be killed. The illness is most prevalent among teenage boys, with reports surfacing that many of the victims are attempting to acquire it on purpose.

Adults of all weight categories are susceptible to yet another variation of the virus known as Turbo Pox, which causes no physical symptoms but may result in paranoid fantasies about being audited.

Dr Hill says the best protection against Turbo Pox is to save your receipts.

If all those poxes weren’t frightening enough, a new animal influenza virus is making the rounds in Europe. Just as with Bird Flu and Swine Flu, Loch Ness Monster Flu will probably kill half the people on Earth by next year.

So far limited to one case in Scotland, the disease has already hurt the tourism industry there.

Scotty Scottsmeyer, a loch operator who works the afternoon shift at Loch Ness, tells The Anvil, “So round about every three years er so, aye, Nessie pops ‘er head up, gives me a stare like she’s gonna bite off me baw bag, but she never does, given that we have an understanding. Only this time, a couple days ago, she looks all peelly wally, like she’s gonna boak right there in the water. Her eyes is all crusty and she’s got a snout full of bogie.”

He added, “Ah’m no banger, so Ah scooted right off, had a few bellywashers, and called the CDC.”

An official at the Edinburgh office of the CDC (Centers for Disease Control) said Scottsmeyer was “talking gob shite,” which we can only assume means Loch Ness Monster Flu is highly contagious and likely to kill tens, if not hundreds of millions of people this year.

WASHINGTON DC – The rising tide of civil unrest across the Middle East and northern Africa may bode well for democracy, but it isn’t doing much to help jobless figures. Each time a brutal regime is overthrown, say economists, another name goes on the unemployment roll.

“It’s true,” says Mary Smith, an economist.

While she may feel comfortable showing a flippant, heartless attitude when discussing people’s ruined careers and lost dreams, the grim news is hitting close to home for some.

“I hate being a statistic,” says Hosni Mubarak, 82, who recently lost his job as oppressive ruler of Egypt. “I want to work, but who is going to hire me at my age when some kid fresh out of college is willing to crush rebellion and stifle freedom for a quarter of my salary?”

Skeletor, who briefly ruled Eternia before being overthrown by He-Man (also not elected) two years ago, claims to have turned in over 200 applications since then without landing a single job interview.

“I’ve commanded legions of beasts. I’ve turned skies black. I’ve laid siege to magic castles,” he says. “But will anyone hire me? No. I also have a masters degree in business administration, by the way.”

Even those still employed in the industry are feeling the pressure. Muammar Gaddafi, who has ruled Libya for over 40 years, says can feel change in the air.

“Sure, I go on TV and say, ‘dissent will not be tolerated, you infidel dogs,’ or ‘you guys are about to accidentally open up a big can of whoop-ass that cannot be closed,’” he told The Anvil today via telephone from his home in Tripoli. “But, realistically, they’ll probably shoot me one of these days.”

Gaddafi adds with a laugh, “At least I hope they shoot me! What else can I do for a living? Barista at Starbucks? Oppressing people and sponsoring terrorism is all I know.”

Other economists, who are not such icy bitches as Mary Smith, sympathize with the plight of Mubarak and others but also believe the evil dictator industry has not changed with the times.

Ricky Roma of Mitch and Murray, a New York-based economic policy think tank, says, “Kids don’t get into the language of evil dictators these days. Look at the guy in North Korea, what’s his name. The deadbeat. Kim something. He says, ‘I, your dear leader, will wield the mighty sword of the free workers to combat the enemies of justice bla bla bla. Who tawks like that?”

Roma says young people are the consumers who drive the world leader market these days. “They want someone edgy and hip, not some weirdo in a Cossack uniform who listens to Edith Piaf records and collects antique deep-sea-diving helmets.”

When asked who he thinks will be the next ruler of North Korea will be, Roma smiles and says, “Kanye, of course. You ask me twelve, fifteen years ago, I say Prince. But it’s Kanye. Don’t quote me.”

Don’t miss Part Two of our one-part series on evil dictators tomorrow, when we interview Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Than Shwe of Myanmar, and the editor of The Anvil.

[Perhaps you should start preparing a story on unemployed journalists. You can file it freelance- ed.]

LOS ANGELES – Wile E. Coyote, the only actor to ever play the coyote on the long-running Warner Brothers cartoon, Roadrunner,was killed in a tragic on-set accident today. He was 63.

The disaster occurred when Coyote ran through the wrong fake tunnel entrance and tumbled over a cliff ledge. Though the actual drop is only about 20 feet, the actor missed the safety mats and landed on a cement floor. An on-set doctor was unable to resuscitate him.

It is uncertain whether Coyote was inadvertently sent into the wrong tunnel by stunt coordinators or he simply made a fatal mistake. Warner Brothers officials are promising a full investigation.

“I don’t know how this could have happened,” said the show’s director, Elroy Jetson, himself a former cartoon actor. “We’ve done this stunt a million times. It’s just a tragedy.”

Coyote’s co-star in the show, Road Runner, also 63, was too despondent too speak with reporters, but his agent later released a statement that read, “Meep Meep.”

Despite the joy cartoons bring to millions of viewers around the world every day, injury and death are no strangers to the industry. Fred Flintstone, who died in 1990 at the age of 70, spent his later years hobbled by crippling back pain that resulted from having to lift a car made with heavy stone wheels in nearly every episode of his hit show, The Flintstones. Another cartoon star, Popeye, endured frequent bouts of kidney stones caused by excess spinach consumption.

Tom T. Cat, who played “Tom” on Tom and Jerry from 1950 to 1957 and now resides in a retirement home for aged cartoon characters in Los Angeles, recounts several on-set mishaps.

“Sometimes it was the simple stuff that was the most dangerous,” he says. “I remember one time my character was supposed to have his tail slammed in a door. The stunt men rigged the door up incorrectly and I ended up with three broken bones.”

Cat explains, “It wasn’t the shootings or the electrocutions that were the problem. Those sockets weren’t live. The sparks were added in post [production, by special effects artists], of course.”

Perhaps the most famous cartoon film set accident prior to today’s tragedy was the death of Warner Brothers star Porky Pig in 1971, who was killed at the age of 65 when an anvil (no relation to this news journal) was dropped on his head. That incident lead to a worldwide ban on anvil stunts in cartoons.

Ironically, Pig had become famous because of an anvil-dropping accident decades earlier. The portly performer had struggled for years to make a name for himself in Hollywood… until he suffered an anvil-related head injury in 1939 and developed a stutter. Audiences were so charmed by his speech impediment that he was soon given his own show, although he is probably best remembered for his guest appearances on Bugs Bunny in the 1950s and 60s.

Pig was eventually replaced as a guest performer by Elmer J. Fudd, who himself died from a shotgun blast while hunting rabbits in 1977.

Valentine’s Day is thought by many to be a day of tragedy and terror, and this February 14th was no different. The Anvil has scoured the Earth (and beyond) to find the most heinous events and dreadful happenings this dark day could throw at us in 2011. But we decided to print these stories instead:

Busted!

Jason Voorhees arrested for shoplifting

CRYSTAL LAKE, NJ – It took a mall security guard to do what has eluded police and FBI agents for 30 years: Capture the world’s most notorious serial killer, Jason Voorhees.

Voorhees, 61, was apprehended at Jenny’s Hallmark at the Crystal Lake Commons in northern New Jersey on Monday after mall security guard Carlos McGillicuddy witnessed the hockey-mask-wearing murderer shove a roll of wrapping paper and a box of candy hearts down the front of his pants.

“I saw this big guy in a mask looking around and acting nervous,” says McGillicuddy. “He just seemed suspicious, so I nabbed him.”

It was only after police came that the security guard realized he had captured the psychopath responsible for the deaths of over 412 horny camp counselors since 1981.

Officers later found Voorhees’ cabin in the nearby woods, where they discovered numerous items stolen from stores at the mall. Many of the pilfered products appeared to be several years old.

“We know that the suspect [Voorhees] kills teenagers every time the 13th of the month fall on a Friday,” Crystal Lake Police Chief Steve Miner told reporters yesterday. “Now we realize that, every time the 14th of the month falls on a Monday, he steals something from the mall.”

He also said, “Who knows what horrors the other days hold.”

A hero’s parade in honor of the mall security guard was cancelled when authorities learned that he had not waited for Voorhees to exit the Hallmark store before apprehending him. Voorhees was later released on his own recognizance.

“I know it’s tough to swallow,” said Police Chief Miner, “But the guard should have waited for the guy to exit the store. In the eyes of the law, nothing was stolen.”

* * *

Valentine’s day sales flat on Mars

OLYMPUS MONS, MARS – Despite a slowly rebounding economy here on Earth, retail sales for the Valentine’s Day holiday on the red planet were sluggish, as they have been for years.

“Man, I’m sitting on a huge inventory of heart-shaped boxes of chocolate,” says Santa Claus, manager at a local Target store. “I can’t figure out why no one wants ‘em. Everybody loves candy.”

His sentiments were echoed by flower-shop proprietor Pinky Middleton.

“I can’t get rid of these roses,” he says. “People bought up all the yellow ones, but the petals are falling off these red ones.”

A retail item’s popularity on Earth does not always translate into sales on our neighboring world. Popular-on-Earth cereal Lucky Charms expires on Martian store shelves while Cheerios and Rice Krispies fly out the door. Ditto for Coca-cola, one of best selling beverages on our world. On Mars, Pepsi and Mountain Dew rule. Other sluggish sellers include Frank’s Red Hot, Red bell peppers, and gift cards to Red Lobster.

“I’m looking for a common denominator,” laments Claus. “But I can’t. It’s like Martians want nothing to do with these items.”

* * *

Fake News blogger forced by wife to post Valentine’s Day story a day late

CYBERIA – A fake news blogger – who was unwilling to give his name – says that he would have posted his Valentine’s Day-themed blog on Valentine’s Day if he were single, but, as a married man, there was no way in hell it was going to happen.

“Ideally, you want to post your blog when your subject is most topical,” he says. “Particularly for holidays. But wives aren’t too keen on spending Valentine’s Day watching free on-demand TV while their fake-news blogging husbands peck away on the computer in the desperate hope that somebody will find something, anything he wrote at least slightly funny.”

Indeed. A Valentine’s Day blog posted on February 15th is about as useful as a pecker on a pope, bogging experts believe. Which forces the question, why not write the blog ahead of time and post it on the correct day, since it’s completely made up anyway?

In response our inquiry, the unnamed blogger was only willing to say, “Uh…”

In what scientists are calling the greatest intellectual awakening since Americans realized they could have had a V8, dozens of knee-jerk reactionaries ran their hands up their bodies yesterday and discovered they had heads sitting atop their necks.

“It’s amazing,” said Ben Tramer, a former jerk. “As soon as I realized I was able to think, I understood that social issues and events have many dimensions, and that people with opposing positions can both make good points.”

He went on say that he no longer blamed President Obama for his uncle being laid off in 2007.

Trixie Bumbershoot, who, like Tramer, was until very recently a jerk, says, “Before I found my head, I automatically said everything bad that happened in the past eleven years was George W Bush’s fault. Including my three DUI convictions. It turns out I was just being a selfish idiot.”

Science is at a loss to explain the unusual discovery. Dr. Carl Hill of Miskatonic University in Massachusetts, an expert on heads, says more research is needed.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” he told The Anvil via telephone this morning. “One minute, thousands of people are posting misinformed, all-caps, emotion-driven comments on Yahoo, and the next minute, dozens of them, maybe 24 to 36, started using logic.”

In scientific terms, one dozen is generally thought to equal twelve.

“What I’d really like to do is remove those people’s heads and dissect them,” explains Dr. Hill. “It’s the only way to be sure of what chemical changes took place. Of course, I’d reattached them afterward. ‘First, do no harm,’ as they say, eh? Ha. Ha.”

Despite the presumed danger, some of those who underwent the sudden change are eager to partake in Dr. Hill’s experiment.

“I used to blame Bill Clinton for all my troubles,” says former loudmouth Otis Tool. “And my buddy Henry [widely viewed as a belligerent ignoramus until yesterday] said Reagan was nothing but pure evil. Now, thanks to our awakening, we’re curious to see what caused the change.”

He later added, “Yeah, I’ll give head for science.”

While some readers may view the spontaneous head discovery as promising, scientists warn there are still millions out there who refuse to consider gathering facts, seeking alternate opinions, and respecting others’ beliefs.

Indeed, 108-year-old Toronto native Pinky Middleton maintains that President James Garfield, who served a scant 200 days in office in 1881, is to blame for World War II, design flaws in the Ford Pinto, and the underperformance of Prince of Persia: Sands of Time at the box office.

“This country was a paradise until he [Garfield] gave government workers May 30th, 1881 off,” says Middleton. “Now look where we are as a nation!”

Middleton also said that, “Sh*t rolls down hill, you know,” though scientists have yet to observe this phenomenon.

*****************************************

Correction: The second quote attributed to Otis Tool includes a typo. It should appear as “Yeah, I’ll give my head for science.” We’re sorry for the inconvenience.

WASHINGTON DC – NASA scientists said today that a massive asteroid strike could occur as early as next week.

“Apparently, the asteroid union has filed a grievance with Solar System, Inc. and says it will go on strike if unfair practices are not redressed,” NASA labor-relations expert Pinky Middleton told reporters earlier today. “We’re monitoring the situation carefully.”

Space Rock Local 124, the asteroid union that serves our solar system, claims that it is being forced to operate in an unsafe work environment. Union leaders say all they want are new orbital paths, not pay raises.

Union president Rocky Ele said in a statement released to the press this morning, “The planets whine and cry about the occasional collision. I suppose they whine and cry about bird feathers on their French doors too. Well, how do you think the bird feels?”

Talk of sending unmanned spacecraft into the solar system to destroy near-earth asteroids has some space rocks spooked. The asteroid Apophis, one of an estimated 45,000 large rocks orbiting the sun, told The Anvil he feels increasingly nervous going to work every day.

“I’m just trying to execute my trajectory,” he says. “But now they [Earthlings] want to blow me up, like I’m some kind of planet hunter. Hey, I never asked to be affected by Earth’s gravitational pull. Where’s the off switch on that thing?”

In a surprise move this week, the Obama administration cancelled funding for NASA’s Near-Earth Object Program, which monitors threats from space, claiming the cuts were necessary for the sake of trimming the budget deficit. That explanation did not stop some Republicans from crying foul.

In an interview that aired on CNN last night, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said, “We think it’s interesting that the President can suddenly make billions disappear from the budget when his labor union friends complain about some perceived injustice.”

Indeed, Space Rock Local 124 was one of the biggest contributors to the Obama campaign in 2008, and, with the Supreme Court having lessened restrictions on outside political donations in a recent ruling, the asteroids figure to be even bigger contributors to Democrats in 2012.

He later added, “Man, I’ve been wanting to say that to someone for the past two and a half years.”

No one is quite sure what will happen if the solar system’s asteroids all go on strike at once. Could thousands of no-longer-orbiting space boulders cause gravitational disturbances that ripple across the orbital path of the eight planets? Will the asteroids begin to collect and form a new planet between Mars and Jupiter that pulls the Earth farther from the sun, plunging our planet into a new, permanent ice age? Or, perhaps, could the moon simply be slammed into Earth at thousands of miles per second, destroying both worlds and ending life as we know it?”

“No,” says NASA’s Middleton. “None of those things will happen. Asteroids can’t stop moving through space, no more than Geico can stop running ads all day. A strike would be a symbolic gesture.”

That hasn’t stopped Russian Space Agency officials from launching the new deep space probe, Preparation H [the H is for Hydrogen Bomb], a warhead-tipped rocket that can be reprogrammed from Earth to hunt down specific targets that enter the inner solar system.

“We offer prompt, soothing relief from asteroids,” said former Cosmonaut Boris Blastikoff, now heading up the Motherland Defense division of the agency.

Union officials from United Comets Interplanetary local 84 were not willing to comment on this story.

BALTIMORE – Goldie, the world’s oldest pet goldfish, died today at the age of two weeks. The Maryland-born fish’s reign lasted an hour, following the death of Fin, also two-weeks old, of Paris, France. Veterinarians say Goldie died of natural causes, though police are refusing to rule out foul play.

Gil Swimson, the father of Goldie’s owner, Emma, has deferred all questions from the media to their family lawyer, Phil Ter, who could not be reached for comment.

Funeral services for Goldie were to be held around the toilet in the Swimson’s downstairs bathroom, but, in a bizarre and shocking twist, the body has gone missing. Baltimore police chief Pinky Middleton told reporters this afternoon that city investigators were tracking down several leads in the case.

“As far as we can tell, the body was briefly left in the care of the family cat, Pickles,” said Middleton, “but after that, it’s hard to say what happened.”

Police say Pickles is not a suspect in the theft, owing to her loss of appetite over being upset.

“Nobody can fake that kind of grief,” said an unnamed source inside the police department.

Goldie’s death has resonated all the way to nearby Washington, DC, where President Obama was hard at work trying to resolve the ongoing crisis in Egypt. He took time out of a meeting with key cabinet officials to tell reporters, “I’m sure I speak for all Americans when I say our hearts and prayers go out to the Swimson family during this difficult time.”

At press time, Goldie’s death leaves Ifukube of Yokahama, Japan as the world’s oldest pet goldfish. Ifukube is believed to be one week and six days old.

UPDATE: Ifukube died approximately two hours after this article was posted, leaving Portia, of Durham, England, as the world’s oldest pet goldfish at one week and five and a half days.

SECOND UPDATE: In tragic news, Portia was sucked into the filter attached to her aquarium and killed at 9:29 p.m. Eastern time today. A search is currently underway to identify the world’s current oldest pet goldfish. More on this breaking story as it develops.

CAIRO – An Anvil investigation has revealed that the thousands of protestors storming the streets in Egypt this week have been doing so without permits, prompting world leaders to shift their support away from democratic reform and toward totalitarianism.

Speaking from the rose garden prior to boarding whatever-the-helicopter-is-called, President Obama told the White House Press Corps today that, “There’s no excuse for failing to follow the rule of law. Democracy is cool, but they should stand in line for permits just like they would if they wanted to install a built-in pool.”

Other leaders, including French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Glenn Beck, prime minister of Glennbeckistan, have condemned the protests, with Sarkozy decrying the lack of “hot” female protestors and Beck saying, “I think all these people should go back to Egypt if they don’t like the way Mubarak is running things.”

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak himself has said he is fine with the protests, but, as President Obama pointed out only four paragraphs ago, protocols must be followed.

“Hey,” Mubarak told reporters this morning, “you just need to go down to the local municipal office, pay two bucks, and you can protest. Is that too much to ask?”

Yes, according to protest organizer Stan Tut.

“Let me tell you about getting the permit in Cairo,” Tut told The Anvil via telephone today. “They ask you why you want to protest. I say, ‘I want to overthrow the government.’ Then they take my two bucks and kick me out! The only choice is violence.”

Indeed, Egypt has become a violent place, as CNN reporter Anderson Cooper found out yesterday when he and his film crew were caught in a skirmish between anti-government protesters and Mubarak supporters. Footage taken by cameramen shows Cooper being staggered by a blow after the crowd surged around him.*

Cooper was quoted by sort-of news Web site Huffington Post as saying, “I’ve never been punched in the head before.” Prior to the punching incident, Cooper was believed to be the only male over the age of five on the entire planet who has never been punched in the head.

Protestor and part-time caterer Fuad Ramses, who was present at the attack, said, “Tell him to come back with a real first name, and maybe we don’t punch him in the head.”

In other news, Time magazine has preemptively declared the guy who invented road salt to be “Man of the Year.”